Almost Two Weeks In

So here I am, almost two weeks into my Costa Rican adventure and I have yet to post anything! For shame. However, it was not out of laziness but more out of exhaustion and a general sense of being overwhelmed. So much has happened in these last days that it is an incredibly daunting task to even begin to set down the bare bones of it in writing.

I woke up at 3 a.m. the day of my flight. With about two hours of sleep under my belt, I set off. A car, a plane, a taxi, a bus, and another bus later, I arrived at my home for the next six months. It was about 5:30 or so and I was completely exhausted. Xinia, the woman I am staying with, gave me my keys and showed me my room. It was a little cabin in her background, adjoining a second where another volunteer was staying, and I had my own room with my own private bathroom attached. At the time, I was just too tired and too frazzled to appreciate it. After trying desperately to understand the Spanish flying around me through my haze of exhaustion, I sat down on my bed in my concrete room and flopped down, wondering just exactly what I had done. I unpacked my things, to make it feel more like home slightly, setting up my books (a crucial step) and then passed out.

The next morning dawned much brighter. I met Joanna, the woman who was staying next to me, and had a delicious breakfast of pinto beans and rice along with a pleasant conversation with my host family. There is a gate around the whole complex and in the front is the house where we eat our meals and where Xinia, her husband Pedro, and their four year old daughter Alexandra live. Behind that to one side are my and Joanna's cabins. Then behind our cabins is another house where Xinia's son, Alejandro, lives with his wife, Gabriela, their young son, and Gabby's mother. Then Joanna and I headed out to the Center. It's about a fifteen minute walk down the death highway. Yep, that's right, the death highway. Right through the middle of the rainforest there is this two lane highway where cars, motorcycles, trucks, and giant tractor trailers barrel through night and day, constantly honking their horns at the bicyclists and pedestrians in an attempt to warn them of their presence while not slowing down at all, of course. After being shown how to navigate the death highway we arrived at the Center. The Center is gorgeous. As the place where I work, it's almost unbelievable. As I type this I am on the upstairs balcony, overlooking the Sarapiqui River through some beautiful trees where howler monkeys, iguanas, and toucans lurk with a tropical garden below me.

Since I have been here I have been sorting through everything the previous volunteers left behind and, as the head of the ESL program, revamping the schedule, curriculum, and classes for this upcoming semester. We are currently enrolling students so I have also, along with Leah, the other ESL teacher and head of the Scholarship Program, been giving placement exams to the new students who wish to take classes. I have also been helping to cook lunches when it is my turn and assisting in the cooking classes that are given by the locals here at the center (which, thus far, has been helping Lee, the Ecotourism volunteer, translate once or twice and mostly consisting of eating all the leftovers at the end). There also is a woman's group called Las Morphas that the short-term volunteer, Anne, has been working with that I enjoy looking in on when they come to the center. They make the most beautiful crafts which they sell to the tourists in an art gallery here and receive all of the profits. I also helped out once or twice with the summer camp that the center is running right now which Joanna, who is the head of the After School Group, and Kaity, who is the Volunteer Coordinator, are running. I can't wait to get involved in more of the environmental activities as well. All of the volunteers and employees here are really nice as well as the locals. It's kind of a small town area so I am getting to know everyone fairly quickly, which is nice. And I can feel my Spanish improving by the day!

I have already been on several amazing adventures while I have been here. Working at the Center we tend to get a good discount on the tourism activities around here and also get shown around to the not-so-touristy places. The third day or so I was here my neighbor, Alejandro, who is a guide gave us a tour of the Sarapiqui Rainforest. We saw howler monkeys, giant ants, 400 year old almond trees, tons of birds, and more. It was unbelievably gorgeous - sometimes I really need to remind myself that I am in the rainforest and take a second to drink it all in. Of course, I also slipped down a hill and got completely covered with mud about halfway in. My host family really enjoyed that story.

We also got to go whitewater rafting, which I have to say, is one of the best highs I have ever had in my life - and it was literally in my current backyard. Zeke, a river guide at Aventuras which is right down the road, took us out on the Sarapiqui River through Class III and IV rapids. At one point, we actually crashed directly into a wall and the back half of our raft was underwater - but no one fell out! I was in the front and I cannot describe the feeling of paddling through the water towards swirling rapids and that first second when the boat drops and all of a sudden your paddle is doing nothing but beating against the air - and then the next second, where you are digging through the water again, absolutely drenched but still in the boat, listening to everyone laugh and scream and shout. One of my favorite life experiences, hands down, and I can't wait to do it again. I think I am already addicted.

Also, just yesterday we went with Zeke and Daniela to some local waterfalls one town over. Once we got off the bus (we knew when to get off because the bus driver was very helpful and told "todos los gringos!" or "all the gringos!" when it was time), it was about a two hour hike, what with all the getting lost and question-asking we were doing. Thank goodness Daniela was with us as she was at least slightly familiar with the area. We hiked up roads and through cow pastures and into the jungle and over tons and tons of mud until finally we heard the roaring of the falls ahead. We were all exhausted and sunburnt, but once I saw the place we had arrived at I knew it was all worth it. f-8">
After we got there we all shucked off our clothes until we got to our bathing suits underneath and prepared to finally, finally cool down. We dove into the lagoon and swam towards the waterfall. It was difficult to get too close because of the tide but there was a calmer, shallow cove to the left of it. I noticed Leah and John swimming towards it and followed them. When I reached it I heaved myself up on to the water-covered rocks and snuck up on the waterfall, following the mossy green wall. Taking a cue from Leah and John, once I was a few feet away from the edge I lowered myself back into the water and finally ventured behind the rushing water by pulling myself along the rock wall using natural made handholds. There was a shallow indent behind the waterfall where it was possible to stand. Once I had established my footing I turned around. The sight, the sound, the feeling took my breath away. The water crashing down, the deep, constant roaring of the falls, the spray covering my face, the play of the light through the aqua curtain – it was exhilarating. I whooped in triumph and basked in my decision to not let my fear overcome me and venture behind the falls. Standing there, face uplifted, sensing in every way the might, the power, the beauty that was only a few feet in front of me was akin to a spiritual experience. The fact that the journey was neither easy nor established made it even more thrilling and satisfying. I could not stop smiling in wonder.

All of my experiences here continue to amaze me, even the most ordinary ones. Everything just seems completely surreal. From getting up in the morning, taking a cold shower, shaking out the ants from my clothes before I put them on, and eating a breakfast of rice and beans or empanadas, to getting to the Center and hopping on the wireless while I stare at the river and the jungle in front of me, to talking to the tourists who visit about our programs and their viewpoint of experiences here, to the local bar where karoake never died and you can hear everything from merengue to Vanilla Ice to Who Let the Dogs Out. Sometimes I forget where I am completely. Other times I get lost in the beauty of the place or am suddenly and abruptly reminded of the realities of living in a third world country.

And I am sure that I seem surreal in a lot of ways to other people, say my host family for example. My pillow here is rather lumpy so the first night I put a pair of shorts inside of it to smooth it out and make it more comfortable. A week in, I came back to my room to find my sheets all clean and washed and my shorts that were in my pillow folded up very neatly at the foot of my bed. Needless to say, I felt a little embarassed and I wonder what on earth poor Xinia was thinking when she found shorts inside this crazy gringa's pillow! I also have such a hard time understanding Alexandra, Xinia's daughter (none of them speak English, which will be a huge help with my Spanish). She is young and my Spanish is not yet good enough to figure out what she is trying to say a lot of times. I have a not-so-sneaking suspicion that she thinks I am a complete and utter idiot. Everytime she tries to tell me the simplest thing it's all "Como?" and "Lo siento, no entiendo" from me. We do have a good time playing games though - hide and seek crosses all language boundaries.

It has been an up and down and back and forth and around and around kind of experience so far. I have met the most wonderful people, gringos and Ticos (people from Costa Rica) alike and cannot wait to start teaching and helping out at the Center more and more. However, as with everything, it is an adjustment. A new country, a new language, a new level of living far away, 2,000+ miles away, from any kind of life I have ever had before. Yet I can already feel it helping me grow into more of the person I want to become and showing me how I can do things I never thought possible. And this is only two weeks in...